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Proceedings of the Royal Society 
indifferent to, this scientific enterprise, especially when Mons. Favre 
has asked ns to engage in the same work, and to undertake for our 
country what he is doing for his ! We are bound to answer this 
appeal. The solution of the same questions ought to occupy us. 
These erratic phenomena abound everywhere in our district. The 
debris of rocks torn from the Alps cover the plain of Dauphiny, the 
plateau of the Dombes, the hills of Croix, Rousse, and Sainte-Foy. 
Already many geologists have studied these erratic phenomena in 
our neighbourhood, without being able to discover a solution. The 
truth, when we seek it, seems to fly from us, but we must persevere 
and pursue it till it is caught/’ 
Professor Favre’s efforts for the conservation and study of boulders 
were not confined to Switzerland and France. Having discovered 
that Scotland afforded an extensive field for inquiry, he sent to me a 
copy of the circulars which he had drawn out, and wrote several 
letters, from which the following passages may be quoted : — “ Si 
vous pouvez organiser quelque chose de semblable en Ecosse, vous 
m’obligerez infiniment, en me tenant au courant.” 
In a subsequent letter, he says, “ Permettez moi de vous renouveller 
la demande que je vous ai address^, en vous priant de me tenir au 
courant de ce que vous ferez pour les blocs erratiques de l’Ecosse, et 
des resultats que vous obtiendrez.” 
I have given these details of the proceedings in Switzerland and 
France, and quoted these passages from Professor Favre’s letters, in 
order both to add weight to my proposal, and show how we may 
proceed to attain it. 
The disappearance of numerous camps, buildings, standing stones, 
and other objects of archaeological interest in all our counties, which 
every one now regrets, has been owing in a great measure to ignorance 
on the part of the proprietors and tenants on whose lands they were 
situated, of the value and even nature of these objects. But this 
work of destruction has been happily stopped, and chiefly by the 
interference and influence of our Society of Antiquaries. In like 
manner, the demolition of boulders which has been going on rapidly 
in Scotland, will, I hope, be arrested, when the proprietors and 
tenants on whose land they stand, are made aware of the interest 
they excite, and of what is being done to preserve them in other 
countries. Of course, it would only be certain boulders which it 
